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General discussion

Sharing always uses the Guest login

by ratbag Nov 26, 2004 2:27AM PST

When a PC in my network connects to another PC in my Network (all of which are variations of XP (Home, Pro or MCE)) the connection is always given the permissions of the Guest login (even though the Guest login disabled).

I can control if the Guest login can access a shared folder, but I cannot control what login is used, it is always Guest. When I used to have a Windows 2000 PC and I connected to that from another machine to access its shared directories, it would ask me for a user name and password. My access rights would be controlled by what I logged in as. Now I never get asked, it just assumes I want Guest.

How do I get it to ask me for a username password when I open a share directory from another PC, so I can control the permissions?

Discussion is locked

9 Posts
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Re: Sharing always uses the Guest login depends on...
by r. proffitt Former Forum moderator Nov 26, 2004 2:43AM PST

First, it's odd to make multiple posts on the same subject. It muddies the discussion.

Second, you didn't tell what file system you use. If you have FAT32, then all users can browse that share.

If you use NTFS, then you can adjust the permissions of the share. But you didn't seem to note that. In short, here's how. Right click on the shared directory in question. Under the Properies, Security Tab, add/remove users as you wish and adjust each User permissions as you see fit.

I don't see any bug here.

Bob

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Re: Sharing always uses the Guest login depends on...
by ratbag Nov 26, 2004 2:54AM PST

Bob,

Thanks for taking the time to get back to me.

>Second, you didn't tell what file system you use. If you have FAT32, then all users can browse that share.

Good point, all machines are NTFS.

>If you use NTFS, then you can adjust the permissions of the share.

Indeed. The problem is that only the permissions that make any difference are the ones that related to Guest. I want some users to connection with some permissions, and some to connect with others permissions. At the moment all users connect as Guest and I cannot find a way to make it do otherwise.

>First, it's odd to make multiple posts on the same subject. It muddies the discussion.

I was in two minds about that, but figured that although these points are related they are also quiet distinct, hence the two posts.

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That's the issue then.
by r. proffitt Former Forum moderator Nov 26, 2004 3:03AM PST

You have to take the plunge into the deep end of the security pool and remove the guest access. Then for all those other users add them as you need such.

You did however show your network is ripe for a worm to do some dirty deed that I hope you can recover from your backups in short order...

No business I know of, and support allows "guest" in any form. It's just too dangerous now with all the Internet Explorer exploits today.

Bob

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XP does not let you delete the Guest account
by ratbag Nov 26, 2004 3:23AM PST

>You have to take the plunge into the deep end of the security pool and remove the guest access.

As far as I can see, there is no a way to do this. The standard User Account menu does not have an option to delete the Guest account.

The more detailed Computer Management application does have an option to delete if you right click on the Guest account, but when selected it says it cannot remove a built-in account.

On XP Guest can be disabled (which it is), but as far as I can tell, it cannot be deleted.

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Re: XP does not let you delete the Guest account
by r. proffitt Former Forum moderator Nov 26, 2004 3:33AM PST

I didn't write to delete the guest account. I wrote to remove its access from the share.

It's a subtle difference...

Bob

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Re: XP does not let you delete the Guest account
by ratbag Nov 26, 2004 3:49AM PST

Sorry, I miss read you. Yes, I can and have removed the permissions, but it does not solve my problem. It simply stops all access.

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If the share can't be used by Guest, then what is tne issue?
by r. proffitt Former Forum moderator Nov 26, 2004 4:05AM PST

I will note that you should talk to your IT person about allowing a VPN from guest, but my bet it was done this way since ... it was easy.

Items 2 and 3 at http://www.networkcommand.com/docs/iindex.html under Additions tackle closing down Guest even more.

No one said this was simple, but it is possible.

Bob

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Re: Sharing always uses the Guest login
by ratbag Nov 26, 2004 10:28PM PST

After much reading and experimentation I have worked out the answer to this.

You log into a PC on your network (lets call that the client) as ?Fred?, for example. Then you look to see what shared directories are on another PC on the same network (lets call that the server). The directories you see depend on the permissions set for the account ?Guest? on the server. The server does not ask you who you are, it just assumes you are ?Guest?. It does this even if the account ?Guest? is disabled on the server!

This example assumes you are running Windows XP on the server and you do not have a domain, just a simple home network. The problem with this is you might want to give some people on your network access to a shared directory and others not, but everyone from client PC?s is treated as ?Guest?.

The answer is to enable ?Guest? on the server, then set a password, then disabled it (you could leave it enabled, but there are security problems with doing that). Then the next time to try to access a shared directory on the server, you will be asked for a username and password, you can use Guest or any other username set up on the server. It stops assuming you are Guest and starts asking.

One thing that caught me out when I was testing this: you need to reboot the client after making the changes on the server. Otherwise the two machines remain connected and you will still be ?Guest?.

I hope that helps others going down this route.

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That's just one approach.
by r. proffitt Former Forum moderator Nov 26, 2004 10:52PM PST

Another system leaves the Guest as is, but removes its permissions except for printing. ALL of this is up to the IT "gods" to decide what effect they want. I can't guess which method or effect they want.

But I see you see that "login" is not the same as "permissions". It has been discussed that Microsoft's security model regarding allowing guest access while the guest account is disabled is flawed. I'd rather not cover that again, but you can imagine the back and forth.

I can only offer two explanations why this access was allowed. One, the login is one system, yet file permissions is another. Two, if one did kill off guest proper (as in UNUX/Linux) then support calls to Microsoft would increase since many IT staffers don't have a firm grasp on permissions.

No offense intended!

All this is in numorous books, classes and web content and worthwhile to discuss here.

In closing, the difference from one OS to another about what happens when you remove/disable an account is worth knowing about.

Bob

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